Offerings in front of the Ozar Hatorah school in Toulouse Photo: REUTERS

Despite early media speculation that he must have been a neo-Nazi, French police yesterday identified the gunman who methodically killed seven people — including three young children attending a Jewish day school — as a recently radicalized Islamic fundamentalist.

Mohammed Merah, a 23-year-old French national of Algerian origin, bolted to a Toulouse apartment in a tense standoff with police — even as his latest victims were laid to rest in Israel.

Hey there, Associated Press: Feeling a little more forgiving of the NYPD?

Probably not, more’s the pity.

French officials said Merah is an extremist who’d recently been to Afghanistan and Pakistan, claimed to have been trained by al Qaeda and said he “wanted to avenge the Palestinian children.”

His most recent killings were sickening: Merah held 8-year-old Miriam Monsenegro by the hair as he shot her in the head, while taping the attacks with a video-cam strapped to his chest.

Earlier, he killed three French soldiers.

Merah reportedly had been under surveillance for some time. And while the French interior minister claimed that “nothing whatsoever allowed us to think he was at the point of committing a criminal act,” an official with France’s leading Jewish group said the minister admitted investigators had lost track of Merah’s whereabouts.

France being France — actually, Europe being Europe — there’s no guarantee there will ever be a credible public accounting of Merah’s crime, his motives — or whatever intelligence breakdowns may have contributed to the bloodbath.

As to that last point, there are never any guarantees when it comes to terrorism. All that can be said for certain is that the need for vigilance is, as they say, eternal.

Certainly this latest murder spree should make New Yorkers all the more appreciative of the efforts the NYPD has made to safeguard their city since 9/ll.

Yes, this has included intensive monitoring of local Muslim communities — a necessary measure that, nevertheless, has given both the AP and its fellow travelers at The New York Times night sweats.